


1000 Paper Cranes

by mimi_chi



Category: Ookami-san to Shichinin no Nakamatachi | Okamisan and her Seven Companions
Genre: Angst, F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-03-22
Updated: 2017-03-22
Packaged: 2018-10-09 04:41:52
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,873
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10404183
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mimi_chi/pseuds/mimi_chi
Summary: “Would you change anything in our lives?” When Taro said ‘no’, he hadn’t been aware that was the wrong answer.





	

**Author's Note:**

> Aka I took a silly codependent pairing way too seriously.

“Did you want to get a drink after this?” 

Taro glanced up from tucking his laptop away into his bag, one eyebrow quirking up. Hiromi Ito was a beautiful woman, clear skin, big vibrant brown eyes, hair cut short and elegantly to frame her face. She was also head of sales of a modest, but well to do cosmetic store that was currently looking to expand from its tiny hometown of Fukui into more populous areas. As a salesman, it was in Taro’s best interest to get a drink with her. To share small talk, drinks, and hopefully share signatures when she signed the account over to him. There’d been a time he wouldn’t have thought twice about following her and her floral perfume out of the room.

And yet…

“Maybe next time you’re in town. My favorite bar is unfortunately closed for renovations, and nowhere else near here comes close.” Hiromi took the rejection surprisingly well, eyes gleaming as she shouldered her purse.

“I would have never pegged you as someone who was so loyal.” She inclined her head when Taro held the door open for her, heels clacking against the smooth floor. 

He walked her to the exit with a small laugh, even though his chest felt tight. 

“Once you find something you really like, isn’t that the proper response?” He said it lightly enough, bowing as he saw her out the door. “Have a good night, Ms. Ito.”

“I’ll hold you to that promise then. Now I’m curious about this place.” She returned the bow, before stepping out into the dreary weather. It had been threatening to rain all day, but the skies remained stubbornly overcast.

Taro watched her go somewhat wistfully, before turning to head back to his office.

\---

“Welcome home darling! Dinner will be ready in a minute.” Otohime, despite having a fledgling career in modeling, managed to get home most days before him to make dinner. An idol looked better if she had a hobby, she had often told him as she packed his lunch full of cookies or sweets to hand out to his co-workers, and she always wanted to make sure he was properly fed. The first few months had been spent eating burnt dinners with a forced smile, but like most things Otohime set her mind to, she had improved rapidly enough, to the point where his mouth actively watered when he made it home.

She took his jacket from him to hang up, brushing a brief kiss against his cheek as he stepped dutifully out of his shoes. “How was your day?”

“Exhausting.” Taro said honestly, loosening his tie with a practiced movement. “Door to door salesmen don’t have to run around as much as I’ve had to, trying to secure this new account.”

“The cosmetics account from Fukui, correct?” Otohime called as she padded back into the kitchen, having heard this complaint often. She still looked sympathetic though, which Taro was grateful for.

“That’s the one. What about your day? What’s for dinner?” He ambled after her eagerly, eyeing the pot that was bubbling merrily on the stove.

“Nikujaga.” It was said absently as she stirred, smiling when Taro pressed a quick kiss against the small slot of skin between her apron and her loose t-shirt. Then, quieter, as if she still wasn’t sure if it was luck, skill, or her connections. “I was offered another small job today.”

“Hey, congratulations!” Taro crowed, pressing another quick kiss against the crown of her head. “What should we do to celebrate?”

Otohime finally turned around to face him, the gleam in her eyes a familiar one, inspiring both terror and oddly enough, arousal.

“I can think of a few things.”

\---

Taro flicked the light on in his small apartment, chucking his shoes off carelessly, mindful of the bag containing his take out boxes. He set it down on the table by the television, switching it on out of habit so that the empty apartment would be filled with the sound of people talking and laughing. He headed into his room to take off his suit and changing into a well worn t-shirt and pair of sweatpants. 

Briefly, he debated about heading to the fridge to fish out a beer, before some inane game show came on and captured his attention. As he sat down to watch, he slid a small shoebox full of colorful paper out from its resting place, delicately folding one paper crane after another, putting the finished product in a wicker basket already full of their brethren. 

\---

Every couple fought, it was just a fact of life. Taro had always believed he and Otohime had ultimately understood each other despite fighting nearly all the time. If it wasn’t his flirtations, it was how Otohime never listened to him, or how both of their jobs took them away from each other. It was little things like where the tea jug should go in the fridge, if they should go out with the rest of the ex-Otogi Bank members to eat, how they were spending their money. If they should start a family or whose parents to see for the holidays.

They had stuck with each other for so long that perhaps Taro had thought nothing would tear them apart, so he had been blindsided two years ago when he had come home to an empty house with only a three word letter stuck on their refrigerator.

‘I am sorry’ it said, and it might as well have been blank for all the sense it made to him, then and now.

\---

“I am sorry,” Liszt had said, despite the fact that Taro’s fist was gripping the front of his shirt, looking actually sincere for once. “But Otohime cashed in all of her favors so she wouldn’t be found.”

“So you know where she is.” Taro said, his voice sounding foreign and faraway to his own ears. He’d never heard himself sound so ragged, so angry, so, well, heart-broken. He’d heard it often enough in Otohime’s voice to know it for what it was, and wasn’t this karma, to have all of the pain he had inflicted on her returned to him with interest? 

For the first week he had believed, erroneously, that this was a joke, a mistake. He had waited patiently for her to come home, bringing her favorite flowers home every day until the house had reeked of them, until they had withered and died and the petals had crunched underfoot everywhere he stepped. 

As the weeks had dragged on, he could hear his co-workers gossiping, some sympathetic and some less so.

‘The only time he has acts like he’s in a relationship and she’s gone already.’ They murmured, and Taro would have laughed if he could breathe.

“None of us know, Taro, so you should release him.” Alice said, gently encircling his wrist, her voice and touch cool. When he didn’t, when he looked like he might toss him across the room just to do it, just to do _something_ , she added, “Have you ever heard the story about a thousand paper cranes?”

“What does have to do with anything?” Taro had asked, voice scraped raw and shaking. He wasn’t sure if he was on the verge of hysteria or rage. How had Otohime put up with this all these years?

“Nothing.” Alice responded, not unkindly, her expression softening into sympathy. “But if you work enough for the bank to outweigh the favors that Otohime cashed in, we can help you find her.”

It didn’t make sense, not even remotely, but it was enough for Taro to release the president, sagging to his knees.

“Tell me what to do and I’ll do it.”

\---

A thousand good deeds and a thousand paper cranes would realize his wish. It seemed laughable and frustrating, especially since the first hundred cranes Taro folded were deemed not up to standard, but it gave him something to do other than go mad.

The good deeds were easier. Buy someone a coffee behind him. Compliment someone with no ulterior motive. Weed an older neighbor’s yard. Listen to someone in need. Help clear an attic. Donate some old clothes. Cook for his friends. 

Learn patience. Learn how to not take anything for granted. Learn how to be loyal to someone who wasn’t there.

\---

It almost seemed like fate that right before he was done with his paper cranes he spotted her.

Her long dark hair had been cut to her shoulder blades, braided and pinned out of the way. Her dark blue suit blended in with the others around her like she was a wave amongst the sea. Her eyes were wide and clear, staring straight forward as she stepped into the subway train.

Taro called for her, but his voice was swallowed up by the noise, and in the crush of bodies he couldn’t reach her. 

It felt like he had been sleeping underwater for the past two years, and seeing her was a sharp jolt to his system, the first fortifying gulp of air after he’d been steadily drowning.

She didn’t notice him.

\---

The next day he took his notebook full of good deeds and basket full of paper cranes to the gathering of ex-Otogi bank members, slamming both down on the table, ignoring how a good few of them jumped, his expression grim but clear.

“Tell me where she is.”

\---

If Otohime was surprised to see him on her way home, she didn’t show it, instead her gaze soft as she took him in. All the anger, hurt, and resentment that he had felt seemed to melt in that expression, and mostly he realized how much he had missed her.

“Otohime-” He started, but she was already launching herself into his arms, her small arms wrapped around his neck.

“Do you remember when I asked you if you would ever change anything in our lives?” She murmured against his ear, her voice softer than he remembered, but stronger. More mature and sure. He turned to look at her, to really look at her, resting a hand tentatively against the small of her back. It had been difficult to try to pin down a reason for her leaving. He had gone through their conversations over and over, picking at them until there was nothing left, until he couldn’t be sure if he was remembering an actual memory or just what he had wanted to remember. Noting his hesitation, she only smiled wetly at him, wiping at the corners of her eyes. “When you said ‘no’ and that’s when I realized that something needed to.”

He was too stunned to speak when Otohime handed her a picture she had kept in her purse. A small girl, with his eyes and Otohime’s dark hair, smiled back at him. 

“I am sorry. But I couldn’t raise her in a house like we had. Where we fought so much, when I couldn’t be sure if you were ever going to commit to me, and not when my whole world was you.” 

It was then that the skies finally decided to start their downpour, or perhaps, it was something else that made Taro’s vision blurry and dotted the picture with moisture.


End file.
